lately, i've taken to dipping the bare wire into some dielectrical grease, before crimping with tool #2. this makes a great crimp, and seals off the obvious entry points for corrosion. transfer of electricity is virtualy uneffected. for anything higher that 50 volts i woundn't use it.

If you want to know if you have made a good crimp the way to test it is to pull it. It is best to test the particular wire, lug and tool you will use by pulling to destruction. In this spec in Table 12-2 are the pull specshttp://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codeq/doctree/87394.pdf
In general you can tell it is a good crimp by the wire breaking before it pulls out. At a more practical level, just give the wire a good tug after crimping to verify it was a good crimp.

If you want to know if you have made a good crimp the way to test it is to pull it. It is best to test the particular wire, lug and tool you will use by pulling to destruction. In this spec in Table 12-2 are the pull specshttp://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codeq/doctree/87394.pdf
In general you can tell it is a good crimp by the wire breaking before it pulls out. At a more practical level, just give the wire a good tug after crimping to verify it was a good crimp.

I looked at the $35 tool above and the $9.99 one on Harbor Freight (search on 97420) because I need a better one. The 2 tools look the same. Not saying they ARE the same tool but they sure look the same.

The magic lies in the dies, they're made to be used with a specific connector. The HF one might not be an exact millimeter by millimeter copy of the "legit" ones, but in my experience, it does the job for the backyard mechanic, where most of the time we're probably using some hardware store brand connectors anyway. For $10, give it a whirl and see if the connectors stay on when you pull them. If they do, your golden.

If you want to know if you have made a good crimp the way to test it is to pull it. It is best to test the particular wire, lug and tool you will use by pulling to destruction. In this spec in Table 12-2 are the pull specshttp://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codeq/doctree/87394.pdf
In general you can tell it is a good crimp by the wire breaking before it pulls out. At a more practical level, just give the wire a good tug after crimping to verify it was a good crimp.